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[English edition] وليّ الدين عبد الرحمان بن محمّد بن محمد بن أبي بكر محمّد بن الحسن  بن خلدون (732-808هـ/1332-1406م)، من أقوى الشخصيات في الثقافة العربيّة الإسلاميّة زمن انحطاطها. ويعتبر عموما مؤرّخا وعالم اجتماع وفيلسوفا، وبذلك مثّلت حياته ومؤلّفاته موضوع دراسات عديدة وأفضت إلى التأويلات الأشدّ تنوّعا، بل والأكثر تناقضًا. 1. حياته يمكن تقسيم حياة ابن خلدون إلى ثلاث مراحل، كانت أولاها (20 سنة) طور الطفولة والتربية، وثانيتها (23 سنة) متابعة دراسته ومغامراته السياسيّة، وثالثتها (31 سنة) حياة عالم ومدرّس وقاض. وقد دارت المرحلتان الأوليان في ال…

[English edition] إفريقيّة هي الجزء الشرقي من بلاد المغرب، لذلك أطلق عليها عدد من المؤرّخين المعاصرين اسم بلاد البربر الشرقيّة. ولفظة إفريقيّة مقتبسة دون شك من الكلمة اللاتينية أفريكاAfrica، وذلك بصرف النظر عن أقوال المؤرّخين العرب. ولهذا، اقترن الكشف عن معنى الكلمة العربيّة في آخر الأمر بفكّ أسرار معنى اللفظ اللاتيني الذي لا يزال يتحدّى فطنة الباحثين منذ زمن سابق إلى يومنا الحاضر. وما هو ثابت هو أنّ لفظ أفريكا وغيره من الصيغ الأخرى المشتقة من الجذر اللغوي أفر Afer (ج. أفري Afri) وقد ورد هذا اللفظ في المصادر اللاتينية قبل سقوط قرطاج بوقت طويل، ونعلم بالخصوص أن سبيون الأكبر (235–183ق.م) قد منح…

[English edition] تقع مدينة القيروان وسط البلاد التونسيّة، على بعد 156 كلم من مدينة تونس و57 كلم من مدينة سوسة، وتوجد على ارتفاع 60 مترا، وهي مركز ولاية يبلغ عدد سكّانها 336000 ساكن، موزّعين على مساحة 680000 هكتار. وبلغ عدد سكّان المدينة 34000 ساكن سنة 1956م، وارتفع إلى 47000 (في إحصاء 3 ماي 1966م)، ثمّ إلى 56000 سنة 1972م. و تختصّ درجات الحرارة بمدى مهمّ، إذ أنّها تتراوح بين بضع درجات مئويّة تحت الصفر في الشتاء، و أربعين درجة أوأكثر في فصل الصيف. وتهبّ على المدينة ريح السموم الصحراويّة بمعدّل 21 يوما في السنة. ويتراوح معدّل التساقطات بين 250 و300 ميليمتر في السنة بالمدي…

[English edition] المهديّة مدينة في تونس يعود اسمها إلى مؤسّسها عُبيْد الله المهدي (297–322/ 909–934) [انظره]، وتقع على الساحل التونسي، على بعد 200 كلم جنوب مدينة تونس. وتمثل المهدية المدينة الرئيسية للولاية التي بلغ عدد سكانها 218 ألف نسمة وفق التعداد السكني لسنة 1975، وقد قُدّر بحوالي 247 ألف نسمة سنة 1980، وكان قد قدر عدد سكانها على التوالي، ب-12 ألف نسمة سنة 1905 ليسجّل 14 ألف نسمة خلال تعداد سنة 1946 و18 ألف نسمة سنة 1956 ثم 21 ألف نسمة سنة 1966. 1. تأسيس المهديّة مثّل تأسيس الفاطميين مدينة المهديّة استجابة لحاجة ملحّة ظهرت منذ الحقبة السابقة، وهي حقبة الأغالبة، إذ غادر آخر …

[English edition] أبو سعيد عبد السّلام بن سعيد بن حبيب بن حسّان بن هلال بن بكّار بن ربيع التنُّوخي (160-رجب 240 هـ/777- ديسمبر 855م) – وقيل لُقّب سحنون لفطنته، أو باسم طائر-، فقيه قيرواني قام بدوْر حاسم في تحويل إسبانيا الإسلاميّة وكلّ بلاد المغرب إلى المالكيّة [انظره] حيث، وإلى يوم النّاس هذا، لم يبق إلاّ بعض المراكز الإباضيّة (جزيرة جربة ومزاب) وعدد ضئيل من الأحناف. كان السؤال يُطرح حول ما إذا كان سحنون عربيّا أصالة أو بالموالاة، وكان يثير استياء سحنون، فلم يكن يشكّ في صحّة نسبه العربيّ. ورغم أنّ اسم سحنون لم يكن متواترا - وهو، ربّما، تصغير على وزن…

, Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. S̲h̲addād b. Tamīm b. al-Muʿizz b. Bādīs (d. after 582/1186), sometimes also called Abu ’l-G̲h̲arīb ʿIzz al-Dīn al-Ṣanhād̲j̲ī, chronicler of Zīrid descent, being the grandson of Tamīm (454-501/1062-1108) and the nephew of Yaḥyā b. Tamīm (501-9/1108-16). He lived at first in the entourage of the last Zīrid of Mahdiyya, al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī, and seems to have gone with him, at least for some time, to the Almohad ʿAbd al-Muʾmin whose support he was seeking. It …

b. Ḳabīṣa b. al-Muhallab b. Abī Ṣufra (d. 18 Ramaḍān 174/28 January 791) was the fourth governor from the Muhallabids [ q.v.] of Ifrīḳiya, where there preceded him successively a distant cousin, ʿUmar b. Ḥafṣ b. ʿUt̲h̲mān b. Ḳabīṣa (151-4/768-71), his brother Yazīd (19 D̲j̲umādā II 155-18 Ramaḍān 170/27 May 772-13 March 787) and his nephew Dāwūd b. Yazīd who, on his father’s death, took over in the interim until the arrival of his uncle Rawḥ on 1 Rad̲j̲ab 171/16 December 787. Rawḥ had first served in the army before rejoining, in 159/776, the group of governors. He is mention…

, Walī al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ¶ b. Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. Abī Bakr Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan (732-84/1332-82), one of the strongest personalities of Arabo-Muslim culture in the period of its decline. He is generally regarded as a historian, sociologist and philosopher. Thus his life and work have already formed the subject of innumerable studies and given rise to the most varied and even the most contradictory interpretations. I. Life. Ibn K̲h̲aldūn’s life may be divided into three parts, the first of which (20 years) was occupied by his childhood and education, the…

, the eastern part of the Mag̲h̲rib, whence the name adopted by some modern historians for Eastern Barbary. The term Ifrīḳiya is undoubtedly—whatever the Arab writers say—borrowed from the Latin Africa, so the origin of the Arabic word must be sought in the etymology of the Latin term, a question which, from the most ancient times to today, has continued to defeat scholars. What is certain is that the term Africa, and the other forms derived from the same radical Afer (pl. Afri ), are attested in the Latin ¶ sources well before the fall of Carthage; it is known in particular that th…

, an Umayyad general who played a decisive part in the consolidation of the conquest of Ifrīḳiya by storming Carthage and finally defeating al-Kāhina [ q.v.]. It is difficult, however, to trace the course of his actions on account of the uncertainty of the chronology and a host of discrepancies. The dates given for his arrival in Ifrīḳiya are Muḥarram 68/July-August 687, 69/688-9, 73/692-3, 74/693-4, 78/697-8; and for his fall 76/695-6, 77/696-7, 78/697-8, 79/698-9, 82/701-2, 84/703-4 and 89/707-8. The chronology given by the earliest chroniclers, i.e. by Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥakam and t…

or Sabratha , one of the three ancient cities (Leptis Magna = Lebda; Oea = Tripoli; and Sabratha or Sabrata = Ṣabra) which made up Tripolitania. Ṣabra Manṣūriyya [ q.v.], another town ¶ 33 km/20 miles to the west of Tlemcen in Algeria bore (Ibn Ḵh̲aldūn, ʿIbar , Beirut 1959, vii, 524), and still bears today, this same name, after having assumed that of Turenne in the colonial period. The homonomy here is fortuitous. Ṣabrāṭa—now a tourist town and the centre of an archaeological zone along the littoral some 75 km/48 miles west of Tripoli and 35 km…

or rustumids, an Ibāḍī dynasty, of Persian origin, which reigned from Tāhart (in what is now Algeria) 161-296/778-909. The birth of the Ibāḍī principality of Tāhart is bound up with the great Berber rising begun by Maysara (called, as a tribute from his enemies, al-Ḥaḳīr “The Vile”) in 122/740. As a result of this rising, the greater part of the Mag̲h̲rib fell away definitively from the control of the caliphate in the East, with the exception of the principality of Ḳayrawān (Kairouan), which only achieved virtual independence with the coming of the Ag̲h̲labids [ q.v.] in 184/800. The Ibā…

(“the Sorceress”) was the guiding spirit of Berber resistance to the Arab invaders led by Ḥassān b. al-Nuʿmān [ q.v.] after the collapse of Byzantine power marked by the fall of Carthage (73/692-3). ¶ Her true personality—which must have been highly complex—is very difficult to discern, for only the distorted reflections of her real features can be detected behind the legend. There is no agreement even on her real name, for al-Kāhina is only a nickname given to her by the Arabs. It is said that she was named Dihya—Ibn K̲h̲aldūn (tr. de Slane, Berbères , i, 172) mentions a Berber tribe know…

(Gabès), a town in Tunisia on the gulf of the same name (the Little Syrte of antiquity), 404 km. to the south of Tunis and 150 km. from Gafsa [see ḳafsa ]; it has 40,000 inhabitants, of whom 1,200 are Europeans, and is the chief town of a governorate with a population of 204,000 (1966 census). The town of Gabès, divided since 1957 into four districts, includes the old townships of Manzil, situated higher up the Oued-Gabès, and D̲j̲āra, situated downstream, localities which have always been divided by fie…

, patronymic of a family of Idrīsid descent and Moroccan origin which settled in Muslim, Spain. It is said that ʿĀs̲h̲ūr, fleeing from religious persecution, came to settle in Morocco. His son Muḥammad was born at Salé in about 1030/1621 and it was with him that the family’s importance in the history of Tunisia began, at first in the field of “mysticism”, then in those of fiḳh , of teaching and of religious offices. Muḥammad b. ʿĀs̲h̲ūr, who was initiated into mysticism in Morocco by the s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Muḥammad al-Kud̲j̲ayrī, distinguished himself at Tunis as the leader of a religiou…

(gafsa), a town in Tunisia 360 km. south-west of Tunis, 200 km from Ḳayrawān, and 100 km from Gabès [see ḳābis ], population 30,000; the chief town of an administrative region with a population of 300,000 whose principal mineral resources ¶ consist of the phosphate deposits of M’Dilla, Metlaoui, Redeyef, and Moularès, which were discovered in 1885. The oasis of Ḳafsa contains about 100,000 palm trees producing dates of second-rate quality, to which must be added orchards of orange trees, lemon trees, apricots and figs, vineyards and, …

, Abū tamīm S̲h̲araf al-Dawla (407-54/1016-62), fourth ruler of the Zīrid dynasty who governed Ifrīḳiya [ q.v.] from 362/972 to 543/1148. His reign was not, as H.R. Idris thought, that of an apogee. If there was an apogee, it would have to be placed early on, before the plague and the terrible famine of 395/1004-5 which severely reduced the population. From this date, and throughout the reign of al-Muʿizz, calamities succeeded one another in a sustained rhythm, revealing the deficiencies of a disorganised and r…

, Abū Yaḥyā and Abū Ṭāhir al-Ṣanhād̲j̲ī , the fifth Zīrid ruler in Ifrīḳiya, b. Ṣabra 422/1031, d. after an exceptionally long reign covering 454-501/1062-1108. ʿImād al-Dīn al-Iṣfahānī, in his K̲h̲arīdat al-ḳaṣr , Tunis 1966, i, 141-2, makes him a Ḳaḥṭānī Arab, with a genealogy back to Noah and Adam, see also Ibn Tag̲h̲rībirdī, Nud̲j̲ūm , Cairo n.d., v, 198. He inherited a kingdom dislocated by the invasions of the Banū Hilāl [ q.v.], and after almost half-a-century of effort, did not succeed in “restoring Ṣanhād̲j̲ī power in its state of disarray” (H.R. Idris, Zīrīdes …

, or also Madīnat ʿIzz al-Islām , a royal city founded between 334 and 336/945-8, at half-a-mile to the southeast of Ḳayrawān, by the Fāṭimid caliph al-Manṣūr— whence its name—in order to commemorate his victory over the rebel Abū Yazīd [ q.v.], on the very spot, so we are told, of a decisive battle. The name. Ṣabra means "a very hard stone" ( LʿA , Beirut 1955, iv, 441, 442). Like ṣak̲h̲r "rock", the term is attested as a personal name (al-Ṭabarī, index; al-Mālikī, Riyāḍ , Beirut 1983, i, 250) or as that of a clan (Kaḥḥāla, Muʿd̲j̲am ḳabāʾil al-ʿArab , Beirut 1968, ii, 6…

(d. after 418/1027-8), or al-Raḳīḳ Abu Isḥāḳ Ibrāhīm b. al-Ḳāsim al-Kātib al-Ḳayrawānī , who had been secretary of the Zīrids for about a quarter of a century at the time when Ibn Ras̲h̲īḳ wrote his ʿUmda , was a talented man of letters and chronicler. Ibn Ras̲h̲īḳ acknowledges that he had a certain poetic gift, although his style was rather that of a secretary, and Yāḳūt ( Muʿd̲j̲am , i, 217-26) has preserved some long fragments from his poems. There also survives his Ḳuṭb al-surūr (MS Paris B.N. nos. 4829, 4830 and 4831; for the other MSS, see Brockelman…